Floor coverings may be finished with polymer films in the factory, subsequently treated using polymer-containing care compositions, or else left untreated.
All of these surfaces may be prone to soiling, even and particularly if glossy surfaces are involved. Contaminants, dust particles and also residues of the surface-drying cleaning liquor may be made more visible and an unattractive overall image may be created.
To solve the problem, attempts are made to remove dust and lightly adhering soil from said surfaces. This is carried out normally by cleaning by the so-called wet-wipe method with mist-wet textile fabrics or nonwovens, without damage to the surface occurring.
In practice, however, other kinds of soil also occur, which adhere more strongly or else, for example, are introduced during bad weather. Such soil may be removed only by wet wiping with cleaning textiles with the use of cleaning compositions. The surface is wetted by the cleaning compositions and the soil emulsified or dispersed.
A sufficient amount of cleaning liquor on the floor ensures the correct removal of the emulsified or dispersed soil. During wet wiping, however, a fairly large amount of residual moisture also remains on the floor covering.
Depending on the cleaning composition chosen, this can lead to visible residues on the surfaces. Accordingly care has to be taken in the selection of cleaning compositions so that, when they are used, the fewest possible residues, if any, remain on the floor surfaces.
A further criterion in the selection of the suitable cleaning composition is the wettability of surfaces. Depending on the floor covering, which as explained above may be provided with polymer films, treated subsequently with polymer-containing care compositions or else left untreated, even after polishing action where appropriate, the surfaces exhibit different surface properties.
With an addition of 0.5 to 1 g of surfactant per liter of cleaning liquor, which is conventional in practice, the wettability is not satisfactory with many commercial cleaning compositions. When such cleaning compositions are used, it is frequently observed that the film of liquid breaks up and islands of liquid with different liquid layer thicknesses are formed on the floor surface. After drying, precisely said islands become visible in most cases, because of the cleaning composition components left behind. The resulting patchy appearance of the surface is rated a distinct disadvantage of the corresponding cleaning compositions in practice.
In view of the practical problems described above, the cleaning power, the wettability and (in the case of glossy surfaces) the reduction in the gloss after the drying are important criteria in evaluating the quality of floor cleaning and/or floor care compositions.
A further requirement, if aqueous floor cleaning and/or floor care compositions are used in so-called abrasion-suction machines or automatic cleaning units, is that the compositions must exhibit a low foam stability and a low foam level, as otherwise the cleaning process will be interrupted by disconnection of the equipment.
It may be stated by way of explanation here that, through the use of strongly foaming cleaning compositions, a foam cushion is formed in the dirty water tank. The float in the dirty water tank is thereby raised above the actual liquid level. Depending on the foam strength, this can lead to the disconnection mechanism being activated.
Manual cleaning compositions which are commercially available nowadays usually contain combinations of anionic and/or nonionic surfactants and in some cases combinations with amphoteric surfactants as a surfactant base. When they are used in the above-mentioned automatic cleaning units, the formulator of cleaning compositions uses preferably, if not exclusively, surface-active compounds from the group of the nonionic surfactants. The reason is mainly in the fact that the anionic surfactants involved, which are used in formulations for manual use, are not considered because of their strong foam-forming properties. Accordingly the formulator must of necessity resort to less markedly foaming nonionic surfactants. Moreover, the developer has been obliged in the past to accept other deficiencies in use, in particular as regards the cleaning performance.
The object of the present invention is accordingly to develop floor cleaning and/or care compositions which may be used without difficulty both manually and in automatic cleaning units, and whose cleaning performance is to be comparable with that of the known compositions based on anionic surfactants.
Accordingly the present invention relates to aqueous floor cleaning and/or floor care compositions containing, based on the total composition, at least 3% by weight of a nonionic surfactant of formula I:
wherein R1 represents hydrogen or an alkyl radical having 1 to 18 C atoms, and R2 independently of R1 represents hydrogen or an alkyl radical having 1 to 8 C atoms, and the sum of the C atoms present overall in R1 and R2 is between 6 and 18, and R3 represents an alkyl radical having 4 to 18 C atoms, and R4 hydrogen or an alkyl radical having 1 to 6 C atoms and n is a number from 1 to 30 and m a number from 0 to 5. It may also be mentioned at this point that n and m normally represent average degrees of ethoxylation or propoxylation.
In a preferred embodiment, the composition according to the invention contains less than 3% by weight, preferably less than 1% by weight of anionic surfactants, based on the total composition, it being particularly preferred that substantially no anionic surfactants at all are present. The absence of anionic surfactants in the context of the present invention means that anionic surfactants are not added intentionally during the formulation of suitable compositions. It cannot be excluded, however, that anionic surfactants may nevertheless enter the composition according to the invention in small amounts through other raw materials or impurities.
It is further preferred that the composition according to the invention includes at least one further nonionic surfactant which does not come under formula I. Particularly preferably the above-mentioned further nonionic surfactant is selected from the compounds of formula II:R5—CH2—CH2—(OCH2—CH2)n—[OCH(CH3)—CH2]m—[OBu]l—OR6  (II)wherein R5 represents an alkyl radical having 6 to 18 C atoms, and R6 represents hydrogen or an alkyl radical having 1 to 6 C atoms, and the mean degree of ethoxylation n is a number from 1 to 30, the mean degree of propoxylation m a number from 0 to 5, and the mean degree of butoxylation 1 a number from 0 to 5, preferably 1 to 4.
In the context of the present invention, Bu in formula II refers to butyl, in particular for example in a form such as is present in commercial products, for example Pluraface® LF 221, which is available from BASF.
Most particularly preferred are compositions according to the invention which contain a nonionic surfactant according to formula II, on condition that R6 is hydrogen and m is 0.
In a further preferred embodiment of the composition according to the invention, in the composition, the above-mentioned nonionic surfactant of formula I amounts to at least a third of and at most twice the weight of the other nonionic surfactant preferably included according to the invention. It is further most particularly preferred if, in the composition according to the invention the amount by weight of the above-mentioned nonionic surfactant of formula I is at least half as great as, but not greater than, the amount by weight of the other nonionic surfactant preferably included according to the invention.
It is further preferred that, based on the total composition, the total amount of the above-mentioned nonionic surfactant of formula I and, if present, the other nonionic surfactant preferably included according to the invention is 5 to 35% by weight, preferably 7 to 20% by weight.
Further preferred surface-active components include amine oxide derivatives, it being particularly preferred that the amine oxide derivative represents a tri-alkylamine oxide having one alkyl radical containing 8 to 20 carbon atoms and two alkyl radicals containing a smaller number of carbon atoms in the alkyl chain, wherein the two shorter alkyl radicals may be the same or different, it being most particularly preferred that the amine oxide derivative is tallow fat-bis-(2-hydroxyethyl)-amine oxide, oleyl-bis-(2-hydroxyethyl-)-amine oxide, coconut-bis-(2-hydroxyethyl)-amine oxide, tetradecyldimethyl-amine oxide and/or alkyl-dimethyl-amine oxide which comprises 12 to 18 carbon atoms in the alkyl chain.
Additional preferred surface-active components are selected from the groups comprising cationic, nonionic, amphoteric surfactants, protein hydrolysates, silicone compounds and phosphoric acid esters and their salts.
Alkylpolyglucosides, which may normally be obtained on a large scale by the condensation of fatty alcohols with glucose or polyglucose and are commercially available in diverse forms, may also be used as additional nonionic surfactants in the compositions according to the invention. Examples of alkylpolyglucosides that are suitable for the use according to the invention are the products Glukopon® 600 from Henkel and Triton®BG10 from Röhm & Haas. Other alkoxylated alkyl alcohols that do not come under the compounds defined in formulas I and II may additionally be used as nonionic surfactants in the compositions according to the invention.
Other surfactant compounds preferably contained in the compositions according to the invention are those from the class of phosphoric acid esters, which preferably include at least one salt of a phosphoric acid partial ester, wherein particularly preferably at least one alkali metal salt of a phosphoric acid partial ester of alkoxylated alkyl phenol is present.
The phosphoric acid esters are surfactant substances that are preferably derived from long-chain aliphatic or araliphatic alcohols. The salts of phosphoric acid partial esters, and here in particular those of alkoxylated alkyl phenols, have provided to be particularly suitable. Preferred alkali metal salts are the sodium and potassium salts, of which in turn the potassium salts are particularly preferred. Phosphoric acid partial esters with a surfactant effect, such as are preferably used according to the invention, are commercially available. An example of an active ingredient of this kind that may be used particularly effectively according to the invention is the product Triton® H 66 (Röhm & Haas).
Preferably, the composition according to the invention contains polyethylene glycol and/or polypropylene glycol as an additional component, said polyethylene glycol and/or polypropylene glycol preferably having a molecular weight in the range of 200 to 2000.
It has further proved to be particularly advantageous if the above-mentioned polyethylene glycol and/or polypropylene glycol makes up 0.01 to 5% by weight, particularly preferably 0.05 to 1% by weight, based on the total composition.
The present invention further relates to the use of a composition according to the invention for the cleaning and/or care of floors which are uncoated or finished with a polymer layer.
Preferably the aforementioned composition is diluted with water using a dilution factor of 5 to 5000, in particular 50 to 3500, prior to the use according to the invention for cleaning and/or care.
The compositions according to the invention are characterized in that the same or better cleaning activity is achievable by their use than with compositions that contain more than 3% by weight of anionic surfactants. In addition, very good wetting behavior is observed with the compositions according to the invention, as is otherwise observed only with compositions that contain more than 3% by weight of anionic surfactants.
In addition it may be stated that the residue characteristics and the desired foam profile of the compositions according to the invention are rated equal to or better than the currently commercially available compositions formulated on a pure nonionic surfactant base.